Mask of Vanitas
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: Vanitas unnerved them all.


**A/N:** Written for the Green Room (Rlt), Challenge #4 – use one of the Majora Moon quotes and include its answer. The quote I picked is: "Your true face... What kind of... face is it? I wonder... The face under the mask... Is that... your true face?". Also for the Diversity Writing Challenge, d18 – write using the ticking clock device. Or in this case I piggybacked off the ticking clock in Birth to Sleep…

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 **Mask of Vanitas**

 **.**

 **.**

Vanitas unnerved them all.

To Ventus, he came in a time of confusion, a time where he felt his one-tight knot of friends were drifting apart. Aqua had become a Master but Terra had failed his test and was now in a sombre mood, and who knew what meant through his mind now? Master Eraqus claimed the darkness had claimed his heart in that spar with Aqua. Ventus had seen something startling too, something that seemed to fill his heart with fear and dread.

And then Vanitas came, bearing tidings he would have been unwilling to listen to if they didn't sound so true. 'Terra will not return,' was the words. 'If you want to see him again, you'd best follow.'

He didn't want to believe it at all. Because why would Terra leave the Land of Departure that had been their home and training ground all these long years? Why would he leave Master Eraqus that was friend, master and father to him? Why would be leave Aqua, like a sister, and Ventus himself like the little brother? And yet there had been that odd look in his eyes, and that shroud that had clouded him during the examination duel. The Terra from last night, with the stars from other worlds and Aqua's wayfinder, would not have done such a thing. The Terra from today, with bitterness and the loss of his chance at mastership in his eyes, might.

So he dashed through the castle and down the stairs – too late. So he followed on his glider, armour-clad, with Aqua's and Master Eraqus' shouts behind. And he forgot Vanitas, until next they met in the Lanes Between.

They argued. Ventus demanded an explanation and Vanitas simply laughed in his place. It was discerning, frightening – and it made Ventus unduly angry as well. His opponent wore a mask and spoke in jest – and he proved far stronger as well. Ventus was cast down, defeated, and the keyblade swept down for the final blow but for a newcomer, King Mickey, to parry it and save them both.

 **.**

For Aqua, it was after they quarrelled. Once Terra had left the Land of Departure on his mission, they'd discovered a frantic Ventus had gone after him. For what reason, neither could fathom but Master Eraqus was fearful and so Aqua's first duty as Master was to chase after and bring him back.

She went through many worlds, following the footsteps of one or the other or something preceding them both. She saw how Ventus had grown and that made her both smile and wonder as to the cause of Eraqus' fear, but she also saw the path of destruction left by Terra, and that saddened her. She really wanted Terra to succeed in this second chance, just like she had wanted him to succeed in their first exam.

At Radiant Garden they met since setting out from The Land of Departure, and in Radiant Garden they stood against a common foe, and defeated it.

But then they fought. Terra and Aqua at first, while Ventus sadly watched. About the exam. About Master Eraqus' comment about the darkness. About Master Xehanort. And Terra went off in a huff and Aqua turned back to Ventus, ready to plead he return to the Land of Departure with her, and was surprised to find him against her as well.

'I'm not arrogant,' she whispered to herself, in the empty courtyard when they were both gone. 'Nor am I blinded…am I?' She had never known Ventus to speak harshly to anyone, though Terra often let his tongue run away with him and the two quarrelled many a time. Ventus though, Ventus was the young, innocent, sometimes clueless one.

Ventus was also growing up, it seemed, and had all the time they'd kept him in the Land of Departure meant they'd denied him the opportunity to do so?

She went off sadly. Or so she meant to do so, but Vanitas happened upon her at Central Square before she could leave.

'Is Ventus getting stronger?' he asked, cackling.

He unnerved her first off. Darkness reeked from him, and danger, and she graced him with a drawn blade instead of an answer. It worried her, that he spoke of Ventus, and so familiarly as well. How did he know Ventus? Had the two fought in the past? But it seemed Ventus had won – or rescued if that was not the case. Rescued perhaps, if strength was the question and a question without worry at that. They fought, and for all his boasting and taunts for death, it is Aqua who emerged on top.

He lay unconscious in the square and Aqua walked with purpose to him, ready to rip off the mask. 'Your true face…' she thought. 'Show me –'

But he woke, or was awake, and vanished into a Corridor of Darkness before she could unmask him.

They meet again in Nevernever Land and this time he has Ventus' wooden keyblade in hand: that treasured keyblade that Terra had given to him. It was in a box of treasures and with that, Aqua understood. It was Ventus' way of saying he'd grown up, but still treasured both his friends and the wooden blade.

And that in no way forgave Vanitas' disregard for it. He snapped it in two as though it were junk instead of treasure. The two of them fought again, and Aqua was angry. Angry on Ventus' behalf. Angry on her own. She won again but she was weary and as soon as she thought safe, she collapsed. Not safe enough though. Though her enemy was downed, he escaped during her slumber and she would curse that day later on for what it wrought.

 **.**

For Terra, he did not meet Vanitas face to face for a long time, though he saw the effects. He saw something had forced Ventus to become both scarred and stronger when they met in Radiant Gardens. He did not understand the fear though, that wonder as to how he'd changed, why he would never return. 'I'll be back,' he promised, 'once I'm done with this mission for the Master.' How was he to know things would not go quite as planned?

Master Xehanort called him and he went, and heard the true story about Ventus and the χ-blade, and he hastened with all speed to the Land of Departure.

And he made it there in time: a Ventus who was about to let himself be swept away by his Master.

He pushed the boy away, to safety he hoped, and faced his Master. They fought, neither understanding each other. Terra didn't see the need to eliminate one of his dearest friends. Eraqus feared Ventus lay now on the path of corruption. Perhaps they were both right. More likely they were both wrong. Ventus saw the need to eliminate himself, but he was not the evil one. He'd never been, and perhaps it was not in him to feel the darkness as keenly as Terra did, or even at all.

But that was a secret that was not to be revealed then. Ventus was whisked away to the Destiny Islands where, outside the knowledge of both Terra and Aqua, he encountered Vanitas again and again lost. In the Land of Departure, Master and Student fought on, until Eraqus fell, and finally the pair reached and understanding but alas it was too late for the Master they treasured.

But Terra let go of the hate and confusion in his heart: the trap that had wound him so tightly, the trap that Vanitas had long since spoken to Ventus about and thus released the boy from the land.

And they all came together in the Keyblade Graveyard and forgave, and understood the dance orchestrated by Vanitas and Master Xehanort was to create the fabled and dreaded χ-blade. They fought. One by one they fell and got up again. Terra focused on Xehanort. Aqua took down Braig, but was felled herself by Vanitas. And then Ventus stood in his way.

'Now you've done it.'

And the mask melted off.

 **.**

The face was not his own, like Ventus had suspected from the tale it would be. After all, they'd been split apart from the same soul. If Aqua or Terra had seen the face, they would have recognised it as Sora's, the little boy from Destiny Islands, but Ventus had only ever seen the island deserted and therefore so no significance in the face at all. Except that it was a face and not his own. Black hair and golden eyes. The darkness as he was the light of their soul.

And then the Unversed were restraining him, and Vanitas was diving into his heart – no, they were both diving, into Dive into the Heart. Only they saw their true forms.

Outside the unwelcome union, Aqua and the newly arrived King Mickey only saw an abominable fusion of the two.

'Ven?'

And at first they saw no difference at all. Or Aqua did not.

Mickey spotted it first.

'No. That's not Ven!'

And the shared lips twisted into a smirk. Ventus' body, but Vanitus was the one in control. 'Correct,' he said. 'I am not Ventus.'

But if either asked if that was the true face of Vanitus, then the answer would be no.

And even the fusion in Ventus did not last for long, if only because friendship meant more to the boy than his own soul.


End file.
